


Circumlocution

by justbygrace



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-02
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-10-13 19:57:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10520778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justbygrace/pseuds/justbygrace
Summary: Nine x Rose. AU. Mistaken Identity.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This story originally took me several months to write.

He really hates the weekend shift. Sure the tips are higher. And, okay, the hours go by a lot faster because the pure volume of people means there is no time to be bored. But weekends mean bachelor/bachelorette parties and he really does not need one more thing to remind him that he is in his late thirties and still depressingly single. But Jack could be persuasive when he wanted to, especially if it meant swanning off and leaving someone else to pick up extra shifts and John really did need the money. Maybe he would get lucky and it would be a quiet weekend. And maybe pigs would fly and Jack would quit trying to set him up with every female that walked through the door.

Sure enough, twenty minutes into his Saturday night shift the front door swings open and a group of people come spilling through, happily ordering shots and drinks and toasting "the happy couple." He grits his teeth and smiles at everyone and resists the urge to telepathically curse Jack into oblivion. He's halfway through passing out the first round when he spots her. She's leaning against a pillar and is absolutely gorgeous in something pink and purple with her blonde hair framing her face. She smiles at him when their eyes meet and he has to remind himself to breathe. He hands over her drink and swears there is electricity where their fingers touch, but a moment later someone calls from across the room and she gives him an apologetic smile before disappearing into the crowd. For a split second he allows himself to get lost in a fantasy that abruptly ends when someone retches dangerously close to his favorite pair of boots and he remembers he still has half a tray of drinks to pass out.

When he spots her next she is seated next to the groom-to-be, one arm looped casually through his and he tamps down the sudden wave of jealousy. After all they didn't even exchange three words, it's not like she flirted with him. John throws himself into his work, filling drinks and helping drunk people queue and when she is suddenly there, arms resting on the counter and grinning at him, he nearly spills the drink he's mixing. She orders a rum and coke and he raises an eyebrow, she strikes him more of a vodka and cranberry type girl. He wants to comment, wants to stop what he's doing and lean across the counter and find out her entire life story, but he has a job and she has a fiance and he doesn't do things like that. Her hips as they sway away in her jean miniskirt sorely test his resolve, but he averts his eyes so he can see her husband-to-be and that helps to tamp down any feelings he may or may not be battling.

The evening drags into night and he has to endure drunken stories and bad pop music and three near brawls but nothing aggravates him more than the sight of her blonde hair alongside the dark buzzcut of her fiance and it makes him want to hurl all the glasses off the counter. She comes over occasionally, to lean on the counter and order a drink or two (he was right about the vodka and cranberry) and smile at him with her tongue resting between her teeth. He smiles back because it's his job and because her smiles makes him want to turn backflips and because he is a glutton for punishment and her smile is tearing him into pieces, especially when he catches sight of it directed towards that Idiot of a Boyfriend. It's nearing three in the morning when the crowd starts to decide to call it a night and she makes her way over one last time. Ostensibly it's to make sure everything is squared away - stating that Mickey is never too good with that sort of thing - and she hands over her credit card as collateral against damages and she is halfway out the door when he finds her name (Rose Tyler) and number on a scrap of paper under the card and he has to grip the edge of the counter to prevent himself from hurtling over it.

He spends the rest of the night cleaning up and waffling between hating himself for even thinking about calling her and hating her for cheating on her future husband. The fact that his brain is even slightly considering dialing her number means he's officially lost it and when he gets back to his flat, he shoots Wilf a text to say he's taking Sunday off; he's still got a few morals left and if he sees her again he's going to do something he regrets. The fact that he enters her number into his phone is something he refuses to dwell on, telling himself it's for emergency purposes and soundly ignoring the tiny voice sarcastically asking if the emergencies might be of the sexual kind. 

When John goes back to work on Monday afternoon, he is relieved to note that Rose's credit card is not in the collected weekend bundle and he disregards the sharp pang of disappointment that goes through him. Jack makes comments about wedding hangovers and John spends most of the rest of his shift thinking of creative ways to end Jack's life. Afterwards the two go across the street to the all-night diner to grab a bite to eat - he might generally dislike Jack, but he's one of John's only good friends. They chat between drinks, Jack's cousin is apparently back in town and he has wanted nothing more than to set her and John up for years, claiming they'd be the perfect couple. John highly doubts it because the last person Jack set him up with turned out to be the creepiest human ever and he fully expects her picture to show up on the news any night now.

The next week progresses in much the same way as all the ones previous. He works every night and sleeps most of the day and that really cancels out any idea of a social life. Besides, if the drunken confessions he hears every night are any indication, social lives are kind of overrated. Sometimes when he watches all the affairs and the bitching about significant others, he wonders if it's all worth it. He'd learned the hard way that relationships don't always end well and putting himself through all that again does not seem like a fantastic idea. It's only in his bed at night (well, during the day), only when he throws in a film to kill time before work, only when he watches a happy couple swaying under the lights, only when he throws in yet another microwave dinner for one, does he realizes just how lonely he actually is.

Saturday night comes around again and John viciously wipes down the counter while thinking of creative ways to cause Jack bodily harm. The man had the indecency to call in another last minute favor because his family was in town and "couldn't you just cover it, please John." The worst part about the whole thing wasn't the favor, it wasn't the first nor would it be the last, it was the fact that John had literally nothing else to do and Jack knew it. It was getting time to consider an online dating service or even just a casual hook-up at a bar, not from this place, but there was that new techno place across town, there would probably be any number of woman looking for something with no-strings attached. His thoughts were interrupted by the door swinging open and Rose walking through accompanied by three other woman. John almost dropped the bottle of whiskey before hastily calling to Adam - the incompetent idiot who pulled way too many of the same shifts - that he was heading downstairs to restock.

Wilf had literally done all the restocking that afternoon but by the time Adam had turned to question him, John was halfway down the stairs. He sank down on the lowest step and wondered what his life had become that he now escaped to basements to avoid young, attractive, smart, sexy...he stopped his train of adjectives for Rose and kicked his boot hard into the wall before standing and grabbing a random case of vodka and heading back upstairs. He was no longer a lad of eighteen, it was time he stopped hiding and simply tell Rose that he wasn't interested in practically married woman. Or he would have told Rose exactly that except he didn't get the chance because Rose never even glanced towards the counter. Her and her group of girlfriends set up shop in the corner of the room and the woman who came to get refills was a loud, obnoxious redhead who seemed hellbent on giving John a migraine. Adam, it seemed, had no qualms about flirting with any and all women and he spent more time at their table than he did anywhere else while John considered how irritated Wilf would be if he tossed Adam out the window.

When they finally left - with no backward glance from Rose - Adam spent way too long waxing eloquent about them and John had come to the conclusion that Wilf would understand self-preservation as an excuse for Adam's demise when the blabbering idiot mentioned that it wasn't fair that Martha - "the prettiest one in the bunch" - was getting married. John gruffly asked if any of the others had mentioned potential marriage and Adam said they hadn't mentioned it and then spent the rest of his shift crowing about John showing interest in a female for once until John heartily wished he hadn't brought it up. He tried to tune him out by considering that maybe Rose wasn't getting married after all, but the way she had smiled at that idiot the other night kept coming to mind and he concluded that Rose was just a heartless creature set on breaking men's hearts. This deduction did nothing to improve his foul mood and he threw himself into completing the cleaning of the bar in record time before stalking out and going for a very long run. 

His phone ringing woke him up at eight am, less than three hours after his head had hit the pillow, and he cussed Jack out for a solid three minutes before flinging his phone across the room. When he woke again it was almost one pm and he showered and dressed before calling Jack back. Jack laughed off the early wake-up call, not apologetic in the least, just wanting to know if John would want to come down to Henriks tonight because his cousin would be there. John was about to tell him no for the umpteenth time when he caught sight of the scrap of paper with Rose's name and number on it - and how he'd forgotten to throw that away he'll never know - and it gave him the push he needed to accept Jack's invitation. 

He shows up at Henriks at six, dressed per usual in jeans and a navy jumper and his leather jacket, no use pretending to be something different than he was. Jack is already there, leaning against the counter and chatting up the bartender, so John stands next to a pillar and tries not to look as horribly out of place as he feels. He's still waiting for Jack when the door swings open behind him and all the hairs on the back of his neck go up. He knows who just walked in before he turns but he has to look anyway and there she is, looking every bit as beautiful as she did the first time he saw her a mere week ago. Ducking behind the pillar seems like a viable option, but Jack chooses that exact moment to spot him and booms out his name at the top of his lungs and John has no choice but to paste on what might pass for a grin and walk towards his friend. 

Jack wraps one arm around John's shoulder and reaches out his other arm, announcing that this was his cousin at the same time as he plucks Rose out of the crowd. John stares between Jack and Rose in befuddlement and she seems to be doing the same thing, but she recovers first, giving him a polite smile and ducking under Jack's arm with something muttered about the loo. John is still staring at the spot where she was, trying to wrap his brain around what just happened when Jack tightens his grip around his shoulders and practically drags him to an empty table. When they're seated, or when Jack roughly shoves John into a chair and drops into the opposite one, Jack demands an explanation right here, right now. 

John doesn't really start at the beginning and his words probably don't make a whole lot of sense, but somehow Jack manages to piece together the story anyway and when John finally stops speaking, Jack looks like he doesn't know whether he wants to laugh or cry. He does neither, telling John he'll be right back and not to move before walking in the vague direction of the bathrooms. John couldn't move anyway and he stares at the pattern of the wooden table and begins to understand that somehow he might have gotten this all wrong. Before he can finish processing that, Jack and Rose reappear and John announces that Rose is not, in fact engaged and then vanishes into the crowd. 

Rose doesn't look at John and John doesn't look at Rose and they sit together for several tense minutes before John realizes Rose's shoulders are shaking. He is afraid she might be crying so he chances a glance at her only to realize she is laughing and after a second he starts chuckling and a few seconds later they are both roaring with laughter. When they finally settle down and can breathe again, Rose immediately apologizes and explains that it's her best friend Mickey who is getting married and she was only there because his fiancee was on call at the hospital. In turn he apologizes for suspecting her of cheating and not asking her directly. One subject leads to the next and by the time they realize that Jack has no intention of coming back it's almost eight. 

John suggests that she might want to take a walk and she agrees and they aren't even a block down the street before her fingers find his. They end up sitting on the docks and chatting about everything and nothing and she kisses him goodnight when he finally walks her home well past midnight. As he heads across town to his place, he find himself whistling for the first time in more years than he can remember and when Jack rings him up at eight am to gloat, he just laughs and hangs up. A month later John cashes in on the multitudes of shifts he's covered for Jack and goes on an extended vacation with Rose. (Jack buys a round for the whole place when their wedding invitation comes postmarked from Barcelona.)


End file.
